SWAN Day, as a holiday, is facilitated by WomenArts non-profit arts service organization which is dedicated to helping women artists get the resources they need to do their creative work. Over the past decade it has raised over $4 million supporting women in the arts and offering networking, fundraising and advocacy services to over 500,000 visitors (via their website) a year.
In the first 11 years of this holiday, there have been over 700 SWAN Day events in 18 countries on 5 continents. SWAN Day has been officially recognized by the mayors of New York, Boston, San Francisco, Washington, DC, and several other cities. Women artists at all levels have been proud to participate in SWAN Day including Isabel Allende, the award-winning novelist; Sandra Oh, a star of the hit television show ER and an acclaimed stage actress; and Famke Janssen, star of the X-Men movies, who have all done online video endorsements of SWAN Day.
SWAN Day as a holiday will give the artists of our community an opportunity to showcase their work and to build skills in fundraising and audience outreach with guidance from the experienced staff of WomenArts. It will also benefit our community as a whole by educating the public about local women artists/musicians/filmmakers etc.
SWAN DAY CT is part of that mission and has been in the trenches for the past 12 years in order to help women gain recognition within the ARTs. SWAN DAY CT's organizer, Jennifer Hill, (recording artist and front woman of Murderous Chanteuse, Jennifer Hill and Co. and as simply Jennifer Hill) has been arranging her SWAN Day event in CT since 2007 and through Hill’s hard work and devotion to the arts, this day has not only formed a fantastic alliance of creative and artistic women in the east coast region, but has given recognition to female media and empowerment.
Jennifer has also received the attention of WomenArts founder Martha Richards whom she has met with on several occasions to discuss her event and goals for SWAN DAY CT. This year SWAN DAY CT has the honor of, being named a "Super Swan" event by Ms. Richards . There are hundreds of Swan Day events that happen globally and out of all of them, only 7 have the honor of being given that title. With this title SWAN DAY CT also received some grant money to help with some of the show's overhead. This past year Jennifer was the second place winner of a woman's advocacy award via WomenArts for her song "Women Unite." https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kDPqL-CHWUs
SWAN DAY CT is truly more Bonaroo than Lilith Fair and not a place reserved for just women. The bands, art, and dancers appeal to both sexes and you will find both genders having a blast checking out all the different things going on. Besides music, 30+ Artists, of the “art” kind, will be setting up mini galleries to show and sell their work. The Art category touches on all genres from photography to paint, film, mixed media etc and during all of this 12 bands will be rocking the house, all female fronted and from jazz to rock to pop to funk etc. All the bands were chosen from submissions of over 100 bands in the area and were chosen to be a representation of the great talent this area has to offer. in past years, we had the honor of having two musical legends grace our stage. Pattie Rothberg (Bw=etween the 1 and the 9) and June Millington of the band Fanny.
We are excited about our mission and are excited that our community is a part of this inspiring world-wide celebration of women artists. If you are interested in sponsoring the event by purchasing ad space please inbox us or write to swandayct@gmail.com
A gift to support SWAN DAY CT is an investment in both creativity and equality. By focusing attention on the work of women artists, SWAN DAY CT will help people imagine what the world might be like if women’s art and perspectives were fully integrated into all of our lives.
If you would like to donate to our effort you can do so by donating through our paypal address ladyblueproductions@gmail.com all donations go towards this year's event.
We appreciate all of you who took the time to read this and thank you for your support.
Jennifer Hill and the Women of SWAN DAY CT